Tortured Soul
by Guard24
Summary: Delving into Killian's headspace before and during episode 5x14, "Devil's Due"


A/N: This oneshot is a very small part of an amazing massive project, The Captain Swan Storybook: Volume 2. There is a fic to go with every episode of Once with Captain Swan and together, the book tells their story. It's pretty cool and you can check it out here: en/document/view/59451187/complete-cssb. This fic in particular is for episode 5x14 "Devil's Due" and delves into Killian's headspace before and during the episode. The artwork for this fic is by Tumblr's talented and wonderful Tennant-the-tigger. Hope you like it!

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Killian Jones has known torture most of his life. But here in the realm of the departed, it's different. There's something to be said for the physical torture of a soul that is uncomparable to 300 years of pain prior.

With Cerberus's bite comes a venom that courses through his bloodstream and sets his skin aflame. He thinks maybe, that's what hurts the most. (But this is always before the next blow, the next crippling of his spirit.) It feels oddly like being alive, but his flesh here is cold and when his blood dries, it seeps through his skin, filling the space where lungs should be. He drowns in it - coughing and wheezing until a new sensation of suffering takes over.

It subsides, eventually. Allowing him to drown in worry for his family, for their safety, before the cycle starts again. Sometimes Killian wonders if the physical evidence of his torture will surface on his now buried body - if they shift from open wounds that burn at contact in the Underworld to scars as his flesh disintegrates. A temporary testimony to his eternity in this hell. Would the scars mar the ink that coat his skin? (He can picture the swan on his chest now welted and wrinkled, a disfigurement that leaves the symbol pointed unrecognizably. On the inside of his arm, maybe a red heart with a dagger's raised tip reaches his palm. And he can picture the feathers on his shoulder bone whose distance is marked by a ragged indention.)

His left side bears the worst of it, with blood still trickling down his face from the blow that swelled his left eye shut and hampered his ability to walk. When death finally took him in Storybrooke after a too long life, he thought maybe the pain would cease. But what he's found is the opposite. All that's left of him is tormented anger. He can feel it rise in his gut, a tight ball that constricts at the thought of Rumple, reborn a Dark One once more at the price of Killian's life and sacrifice. Though Killian's not sure who he hates more at this point - his foil in his past life, or the one who stands before him now, requesting that he engrave his friends' names into a tombstone.

His muscles protest as Hades yanks him from the ground, and he knows if it weren't for the devil's grip, he would fall right back down. It reminds him of his childhood, of days spent as a slave as he scrubbed away at worn wood. His reward was enough food to keep him alive and a beating if the captain's mood was sour.

The river before them glows an unnatural green. For a moment, he wonders if it would take away this pain, but he can feel it, can feel it's danger and sadness. He's well acquainted with this emotion, and he never wishes to know it again.

"This is the River of Lost Souls," Hades warns. "Touch it, and it will make you lost, reducing you to a mindless, tormented husk. So please, keep all arms and hand inside the boat."

-/-/-

He embraces the pain now.

Physical pain, he could handle. Once his sides go numb, the bruise of tightened chains over cut flesh no longer feeling, he knows it will be over. It's the last reality he has to cling to. So though it may be bleak, he holds on to the way his shoulder aches as if it could be severed from his body. With each descent into the murky green waters, he tries to recall every detail he can of his life before. Of Emma.

He tries not to think about the way her green eyes filled with tears in their last moments together, or how she's here and their best laid plans are all in vain. He tries not to worry about her safety, knowing how strong, smart, and capable she is.

Instead, he tries to remember her radiant smile and how he had the honor of making it more commonplace. He thinks of her laugh and nights shared together on the Jolly. The way she scarfed down food as if was disappearing and the way her touch healed parts of him he had long forgotten. He thinks of her, conjuring up every memory he has. The last thing he thinks of will be Emma Swan.

 _Until I met you._ He recalls his own words to Emma in the heat of Neverland. It was always her. It was always leading to her. But fate seems to twist and contort itself for the both of them. He had been lost, after Liam, after Milah, and he supposes he deserves this, too. Maybe somehow this was his fate, that he remain lost for all of time. Being good, choosing to be a hero, comes with a price steeper than villainy. When you are good, you feel the weight of your mistakes and sins. Regret digs down deep in the pit of your soul and swallows you whole. He deserves this, but Emma doesn't.

He can feel his consciousness fading even before he's touched the water and he just hopes that Emma will once again find the type of happiness he had with her.

-/-/-

"I got you." Emma heaves as she hauls him to safety. He tries to help her, pull himself up, but she's faster, stronger, and has him sitting up before he can process what's happening.

She's beautiful, his savior. He knows now that his memories could never capture how truly stunning she is. There's no darkness tethering itself to her now. She is just light. She's his light. Her presence brings with it the hope he had lost.

"Oh Killian," Her voice is soft and her touch hesitant, fingers lightly grazing over the wounds that cover the side of his face. He doesn't deserve this. He doesn't deserve her. Not only did she venture to hell in a stupid attempt to save him, but her whole family did. Risking their lives for what? He had died to right his wrong - to make sure no one ended up here.

"I told you to let me go. You shouldn't be here. Nobody should."

"I never listen."

He wants to laugh at that, at the truth of her words, but everything _hurts_ and her eyes gleam from unshed tears. Though he can't even be mad because she's here, his bloody stubborn Swan. "You're impossible."

"And you love me for it."

That he did. And he would love her til the end of time. He's not sure how he'll return to the land of the living, but he has yet to see he her fail.


End file.
